[droolie]

Brad,

You are incredibly good at giving advice. You have been very helpful to me and I personally would like to thank you.

I look at your numbers and think, "Why the hell is he playing like that?" For someone as knowledgeable as you are and as skillful as you are, you shouldn't be afraid to play more hands. You clearly know when to fold and won't allow yourself to get trapped too often, so why cut all the marginally profitable plays out of your repertoire? When you play that tight your margin is very thin because you're not pushing the edges. Think about it. You're incredibly susceptible to bad streaks and being card dead when you're that tight because you don't play enough to make up for the bad beats and suckouts. My database is full of players who have similar numbers to yours who are only marginal winners. If you throw away every marginal +EV situation that adds up to a HUGE amount of money being left on the table and an anemic winrate. I'm not saying play 20%+ but you have to at least play 14%+.

My guess is that at 5/10 the margins are very small and you have to take advantage of every opportunity you can. I may be way off base but tightening up more wasn't the right adjustment. You should have loosened up! Vary your play more. Don't let the sharks at 5/10 have you so easily pinpointed. Your 17/8/3 numbers were fine you were probably just misapplying some of the SSH concepts. You've been thiking about them for many months now so surely you're more likely to be able to apply them better now. If you can't bring yourself to do this at 5/10 do it at .50/1 until you gain confidence. For chrissakes man gamb00l! You give awesome postflop advice so you clearly have the postflop skills and can make the most out of marginal hands. You seem like you might be playing too scared preflop and that might be indicative of a risk averse personality. That isn't what you want if you're playing poker.

Like everyone else I think you should take some take some time off of 5/10 and perhaps poker in general. Reevaluate you're game and come back with a new computer rig and a LAGier attitude. You should definitely be able to four-table with your skills with very little practice.

Good luck man. I hate to see someone who is so helpful struggle so much.



-Jamie